"On the Golden Horn, madam," I said.
She stamped her foot, and her voice rang so shrill that the black
slaves, carrying out the dishes, rolled alarmed eyes at her. "Think
you I will be treated like a child?" she cried out. "What means all
this?"
Then close to her went Catherine, and flung an arm around her, and
leaned her smooth, fair head against her sister's tossing golden
one. "For the sake of those you love and who love thee, sweetheart,"
she whispered.
But Mistress Mary pushed her away and looked at her angrily. "Well,
what am I to do for their sakes?" she demanded.
"Seek to know no more than this. The goods came on the Golden Horn
but now, and 'tis the list you gave this morning."
"But it was not my list, and I deceived my grandmother, and I will
go to her now and out with the truth. Think you I will have such a
falsehood on my soul?"
Catherine leaned closer to her and whispered, and Mary gave a quick,
wild glance at me, but I know not what she said. "I pray thee seek
to know no more than that the goods came but now in a boat from the
Golden Horn, and 'tis the list you gave this morning," said
Catherine aloud.
"They are not mine by right, and well you know it." Then a thought
struck me, and I said with emphasis, "Madam, yours by right they are
and shall be, and I pray you to have no more concern in the matter."
Then so saying, I hastened out and went through the moonlight to the
wharf to seek Captain Tabor and the captain of the Earl of Fairfax,
who had come with his goods to see to their safety. Both men were
pacing back and forth, smoking long pipes, and Captain Watson, of
the Earl of Fairfax, a small and eager-spoken man, turned on me the
minute I came within hearing. "Where be my Lady Culpeper's goods?"
said he; "'tis time they were here and I on my way to the ship.
Devil take me if I run such a risk again for any man."
Then I made my errand known. I had some fifty pounds saved up from
the wreck of my fortunes; 'twas a third more than the goods were
worth. Would he but take it, pay the London merchant who had
furnished them, and have the remainder for his trouble?
"Trouble, trouble!" he shouted out, "trouble! By all the foul
fiends, man, what am I to say to my Lady Culpeper? Have you ever
had speech with her that you propose such a game with her?"